


corona

by CorvidFeathers



Category: Hamlet (1921), Hamlet - Shakespeare, SHAKESPEARE William - Works
Genre: F/F, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Internalized Misogyny, Jealousy, this is a fanfic for the 1921 silent hamlet where hamlet is a woman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 01:32:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16609328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorvidFeathers/pseuds/CorvidFeathers
Summary: “Isn’t she a fine sight?” Horatio said.Hamlet, as was her custom, ignored the question that she did not like.





	corona

**Author's Note:**

> I continue to take an overabundance of shakespeare courses and was introduced to Asta Nielsen's 1921 German silent Hamlet this semester and fell in love. I could write a whole dissertation on the portrayal of intimacies in this film. but here's a little fic instead.
> 
> (The film's one big flaw imo is the enforced heteronormativity w/ the Ophelia subplot being pushed off to Horatio instead but I don't agree that Nielsen!Hamlet was totally uninterested in Ophelia)

The morning sun fell harsh and bright, searing away the lovely shadows of the castle garden.  There was no escape from the onslaught of wan white light; it pierced through Hamlet’s eyes and there met with the staves of the headache she had woken with, driving it deeper into her brain.

Outside of her headache, she wasn’t sure which was worse: the slithering, feverish heat of the sun or the heat of Horatio’s gaze as he followed Ophelia about the garden.  

Horatio had the luxury of ignorance; he could get lost in the way the light played on her hair, the cherubim glow of her eyes and lips. Hamlet could see only the puppet strings hooked around her wrists and neck in a strangling necklace, forcing her to tip and turn around the garden, trailing her veils and temptations forced upon her by other eyes. 

“Isn’t she a fine sight?” Horatio said.

Hamlet, as was her custom, ignored the question that she did not like.  

But she neither Chaucer nor talk of their scheme could pull Horatio’s eyes from the spectacle

The building ache behind Hamlet’s eyes was becoming unbearable, the light piercing deeper, meeting with the lines of tension drawn around her jaw and neck and setting them ablaze.  She tried to turn her face from the sun, but neither the featureless sky nor Ophelia’s proscribed puppet dance brought any relief.

She knew what would.

“Horatio…” she murmured, pressing a hand to her head.

It did not take him a moment longer than usual to hear the pain in her voice.

“Hamlet?” His attention was again all her own, concern written ink-obvious across his familiar features.  His hand closed on her shoulder.  In the garden, Ophelia moved slowly along her proscribed path, the idle breeze tugging at stray strands of her hair, plastering them to the fine curve of her neck.  The gleam of her eyes said she saw the pair watching her and was pretending not to, as befit her role.

The heat of the day was burning through Hamlet like a fire through thin parchment; she knew Horatio must feel it through her clothes.  His hand brushed against her forehead, cold and merciful, and he said something that was lost in that touch.

The world, and Ophelia, danced before her eyes, bright and painful, until she swooned into his arms and Horatio blotted out the sun.


End file.
